Background

Heart failure affects more than half of the population over 65 and represents an enormous financial burden to the society. The Cardiovascular Research team of the Luxembourg Institute of Health has discovered and patented hundreds of circRNAs detectable in the blood and associated with cardiovascular conditions such as heart failure.

Circular RNAs are a class of noncoding RNAs covalently closed by a back spicing event, making them protected from degradation by exonuclease. They are tissue- and disease-specific and are detectable in the blood. They can be measured in a highly specific manner using sequencing, methods based on probe hybridization, or quantitative PCR with divergent primers. These properties confer circRNAs with valuable potential as have potential to be used